Sudan calls on its refugees to return home after 20 die
Sudan-Egypt, Politics, 12/31/2005

The Sudanese minister of state for foreign affairs Ali Ahmad Karti called on the Sudanese refugees in Cairo to return back to their country, after the death of 20 of them, and the injuring of 66, during forced evacuation by Egyptian police from a public square during a protest in the downtown of Cairo, Egypt. 73 Egyptian policemen were wounded in the incidents.

Karti appealed the Sudanese asylum seekers in Egypt to return home, stressing that returning back for them is better then what they had been exposed to in Egypt.

Before leaving Cairo returning back to Khartoum, Karti expressed his regret over the killing of many observers of the sit in including children during the clashes on Friday with the police men, stressing simultaneously that after the signing of the inter-peace agreement in Sudan, the observers of the sit in lost any pretext for seeking political asylum to any other country.

Karti held the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, responsible for what had happened with the Sudanese asylum seekers because it did not fulfill its earlier promises to them, stressing that the observers of the sit in were not politicians.

For his part, the chairman of the human rights group in Sudan Ghazi Suleiman stressed in a statement to al-Jazeera satellite TV that the hard economic conditions the country faces against the possibility of receiving the observers of the sit in, calling on the UNHCR to shoulder its responsibility towards them.

Several leaders of the Sudanese observers of the sit in in Cairo said that among the killing were two children who were killed during the clashes which took place after the Egyptian police had broken into a camp in which 2500 Sudanese refugees settled in since the end of September this year in order to pressure the UNHCR to fulfill its obligations and ensure a residence for them in a third country.

According to the Egyptian ministry of the Interior, some 20 observers of the sit in were injured during the clashes while 30 Egyptian police men were also injured.

Al-Jazeera TV said that the police were able after violent clashes to force all observers of the sit in to get on buses which took them to a security camp in preparations to take them back home The correspondent added that the ministry of health had warned against converting the center to a bad health center because it lacks health services and necessary utilities which are not enough to meet the basic needs for the observers of the sit in.

Previous Stories:
  UNHCR regrets the death of Sudanese asylum seekers in Egypt   (12/31/2005)
  Ten killed in removing Sudanese refugees by force in Cairo   (12/30/2005)
  Egypt intervenes in Sudan and Chad tensions   (12/26/2005)
  Preparation for the fourth round of the Egyptian-Sudanese   (11/11/2005)

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